Top Food Editors
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Top Food Editors: Day 20 & Julie Duvac Bowes
Day 20 of Top Food Editors features Julie Duvac Bowes of New Orleans. She began her career of 30 years as the Food Editor of the Times-Picayune in 1949 under the pen name of Sue Baker. She tested on her family the recipes that she used in her twice-weekly column, published on Thursdays and in color on Sundays in the Dixie Roto Magazine. She graduated from Louisiana State University with a degree in home economics in 1942. She married during World War II, and her husband later became a judge. She raised five children and was an accomplished golfer.
- food editors, food history, food journalism, Francis Blackwood, journalism history, Top Food Editors
Top Food Editors: Day 19 & Mary Acton Hammond (Frances Blackwood)
Day 19 of Top Food Editors features Mary Acton Hammond who used the pen name “Frances Blackwood” for the Philadelphia Bulletin. Mary Acton Hammond was hired as the newspaper’s first food editor in 1929. She worked out of her own kitchen where she tested her recipes – for 53 years. In 1941, she traveled to England interviewing British women about how they prepared food during the war. It led to a series of columns which First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt mentioned in her “My Day” column. In looking to normalize and understand the women of war-torn Britain, Philadelphia Bulletin food editor Mary Acton Hammond, who used the pen name “Francis Blackwood,”…
- Clarice Rowlands, food editors, food history, food journalism, journalism history, Milwaukee Journal, Top Food Editors
Top Food Editors: Day 18 & Clarice Rowlands
Day 18 of Top Food Editors features Clarice Rowlands. Clarice Rowlands was the food editor of the Milwaukee Journal in the 1950s – an interest that she said started when she was a member of the 4-H Club in high school. A 1936 graduate of the University of Wisconsin, she was a society reporter at a Green Bay newspaper from 1937 until 1943 and then joined the Journal. She occasionally wrote under the pen name Alice Richards. She was married to fellow Journal employee Charles Nevada. She said she was often asked the question that tends to irritate many food writers: “Does she cook?” Many of these women found that…
- food editors, food history, food journalism, Josephine Gibson, journalism history, Top Food Editors, women's page history
Top Food Editors: Day 17 & Josephine Gibson
For Day 17, features Josephine Gibson of the Pittsburgh Press. According to the newspaper’s photo archive:This photo was taken at Pittsburgh’s Hilton Hotel in 1961, the year that Josephine Gibson retired after a 24-year career as food editor of The Pittsburgh Press. Gibson had earned a degree in home economics from Carnegie Institute of Technology in 1924. In 1927, she founded and directed the home economics department at the H.J. Heinz Company. At a model kitchen arranged on a stage in the Heinz plant auditorium, she lectured while demonstrating how to cook specific dishes. She developed and tested recipes using Heinz products and gave demonstrations to more than 80,000 people…
- Florida food, Florida Women's Pages, food editors, food journalism, journalism history, Top Food Editors, women's page history
Top Food Editors: Day 16 & Ruth Gray
Day 16 of Top Food Editors features Ruth Gray. Ruth Gray became the food editor in 1963 of the St. Petersburg Times and began reviewing restaurants in 1974. One restaurant that earned a negative review named their crab sandwich in her honor. She earned a bachelor’s degree in home economics from Kansas State University. She married and raised a daughter. When she was investigating a restaurant, Gray wore hats and scarves and ducked inside the ladies room to take notes and remain inconspicuous. The disguises were needed because some restaurants posted her photo on the wall in the kitchen—a common practice because restaurant owners looked to identify critics.
- food editors, food history, food journalism, Grace Hartley, journalism history, Top Food Editors, women's page history
Top Food Editors: Day 15 and Grace Hartley
Day 15 of Top Food Editors features Grace Hartley from Atlanta. Grace Hartley had a home economics degree from the Georgia College for Women in Milledgeville – now Georgia College. Her first job was with a social service agency where, in the depth of the Depression, she taught social workers how to plan meals for families and instructed people in food preparation. She was the food editor at the Atlanta Constitution for more than four decades, 1936 to 1970 and wrote for the newspaper’s weekly magazine for another decade. She worked for the War Production Board during World War II. She wrote a well-respected cookbook about Southern food. She had…